What's Up, Doc?

Well, it's official. Brian is now "Dr. Brian." This post is a bit delayed due to our travel and all, but Brian walked through NIU's graduation last Friday and then defended his dissertation on Tuesday (a little backwards, we know). Here is a photo of Brian being hooded at the ceremony:

Chase had a fun time in the stands with the whole family!

After the ceremony Chase finally was able to get a closer look at what Daddy called his "Harry Potter outfit:"

It didn't take long for him to go for that tassel!

While we were in town Chase was also able to do some swimming with both sets of grandparents at their hotels:

And we were also finally able to go the Field Museum. That was the one museum we really wanted to see when we lived in Chicago, but the one museum we never made it to. Chase had fun there with both sets of grandparents:


And I also must mention the fun Chase had with his Aunt Jen over the weekend, who he just adores. Here is a photo of them reading a "Star Wars" book at breakfast the day after Brian's graduation:

It was a good weekend for the whole family to meet up, because we were also able to celebrate Mother's Day together! We went out for good Chicago style pizza to celebrate. You can't go back to Chicago and not have that deep dish pizza!

While we were in town we were able to spend time with friends Bart and Nicole (and their adorable baby, Conor!), who were generous enough to put us up for a few days. I was also able to meet up with some old Chicago theatre friends for a bit and that was really nice, too. Seeing Nicole again was awesome. I shed more than one tear when we had to say goodbye again. Luckily I will be seeing her again this summer! More on that another time.

It is hard to believe Brian is really done. He has been working on his doctorate for so long (7 1/2 years)! I keep calling him "Doctor" and he hates it... But I say, "You've earned it! Eat it up!" His first day back in Texas he literally had nothing to do and did not know what to do with himself. When I got home there was homemade pizza for dinner, the lawn was all groomed and beautiful....

I could get used to this!

More photos of our weekend in Chicago are in our Photo Album if you're interested.